Glass Menagerie @ Emmanuel Friedens Church, Schenectady, 9/27/13

SCHENECTADY–Tennessee Williams’s play “The Glass Menagerie” is 69, but unlike baby boomers of that age, is not yet retired, nor ready to be, at least as performed by Our Own Productions staging of it, which Patrick White directed. It is a play that most of us probably have fond memories of and strong opinions about, so viewing a new production can seem a little risky – will it live up to our expectations of it, or fall flat? Like a seemingly fragile Southern belle, though, the play surprises us with an inner strength to endure.

In a small gym, complete with basketball hoop, the staging was modest, with the bare minimum of furniture and lighting. A wise decision was made to stage it in the middle of the floor, with the audience on three sides. As Tom Wingfield (Charlie Owens), functioning as the narrator, enters, he speaks directly to the audience and individual members of it: “The play is memory. Being a memory play, it is dimly lighted, it is sentimental, it is not realistic.” Right from the start, Tom, draws us into his memories, engaging our interest. As the narrator, he is the only character to directly address the audience. He has a fondness and sense of humor that I didn’t remember being there. Perhaps time has softened the edges of the play as well, allowing a more nuanced performance.

As the play progressed, it felt as though we, as the audience, were watching events from the past through a crystal ball that Tom conjured up. The utilitarian auditorium was forgotten, as we were drawn into the world of the Wingfields. Living even further in the past is Amanda (Katherine Ambrosio), now living in poverty after having been abandoned by her husband years before. Unlike her husband’s actual escape, though, her escape is the past and her glory days as a Southern belle. She is tethered to the present by Tom and his crippled sister Laura (Katie Poladian), who live with her in a shabby, claustrophobic apartment.
Amanda is worried that Laura will have no one to take care of her later in life, being forced to eat the “crust of humility.” Tom arranges to have a co-worker Jim (Kai Pisila) come to dinner, to appease his mother’s worries about Laura having no gentlemen callers. Jim is an intruder into the genteel shabbiness of the Wingfields. Even though the promise of his youth has faded, he still has a brash optimism for the future, clashing with their dismal outlook. The dinner ends disastrously, and Tom, like his father, abandons the family, but never forgets them.

All four actors were exceptional, drawing us into their characters, making us forget our preconceptions of how they should be interpreted.